Sunday, August 29, 2010

What's a Vacation

In honor of The Boss's impending departure and inevitable battle against the Great Northern Canadian Mosquito, I did something I have seldom ever done before. I TOOK A DAY OFF.

I can't remember the last time I TOOK A DAY OFF. I may have missed work once in the 80's, but honestly, thanks to youthful substance abuse, that entire decade is pretty much lost to me. I recall something about bad music, big hair, spandex, and shoulder pads, but really the whole mess is just a blissfully blurry blank spot between the Hippies and Grunge.

I have heard guys around the office that TOOK A DAY OFF talking about it, and it seems that this function is always associated with golf, beer, travel, or some other fun and exciting activity. Since The Boss will be gone for quite some time, a fun and exciting activity is exactly how we should spend some time together, and TAKING A DAY OFF is the way that seems to be done.

The DAY OFF started like any other, up at 6:00am, life bringing delicious coffee, take the hounds for the morning walk, FOOD, and an ice cold shower thanks to The Princess's hot water stealing trolls. After the uncontrollable shiver spasms subsided and I was able to get out of the fetal position, I cautiously approached The Boss. I have learned over the years that you must never confront The Boss directly, cautiously and from the side is the best option, but really, when one TAKES A DAY OFF, there is no telling what the reaction will be.

"So, what are we going to do today?" I ask with out making direct eye contact, secretly hoping that the answer includes beer and golf. "Well," The Boss replied, "I thought I should show you a few things you will need to know." At this point, I knew that the Golf Gods would not be smiling on me this day, but thoughts of beer where still close and not yet dashed.

"This is a DISHWASHER", The Boss was pointing at an oddly shaped metal contraption under the kitchen counter. "You place dirty dishes in here, add soap to here, close the door and press this button." I was stunned.. All this time I had never even noticed this weird and wonderful invention. "Once the DISHWASHER has completed it's cycle, the dishes will be clean and dry, and you can put them here." The Boss was pointing at one of the doors in the kitchen. I had often wondered where clean dishes come from.. I had always assumed that the Trolls and the missing hot water were somehow involved.

This process was repeated over and over. Apparently we have a WASHER where dirty clothes go separated carefully by color and texture, a DRYER which turns wet, clean clothes into piles of unidentifiable lumps of wrinkled fabric, and some mysterious unseen force takes away our trash if we place it by the curb every Monday and Thursday morning!! The dog run gets cleaned daily, plants in the house need water (which I am thinking the Trolls can handle), and bills come in the mail and need to be paid ON LINE.. Dogs get heart-worm medicine on the days circled in red on the calendar and flea treatment on the days in blue. Behind another door, near The Princess Suite, there is a doggy torture device that strikes fear and panic in our spook Cy, but removes all the dog hair from the area rugs and furniture. Cy needs to be tormented at least twice a week. Wow.. OK I think I've got it.

The rest of THE DAY OFF followed this pattern, The Boss introducing me to new and scary functions that go on behind the scenes in the household, and me trying desperately to figure out how to include beer in these activities. Whenever The Boss noticed my eyes glazing over and drool running from the jaw opened in amazement she would punctuate the lesson with a stern "Got It?!" Which would snap me back from the 16th green and surely have made me spill my beer had I had been allowed to have one.

Today I have learned many valuable lessons. The biggest of which are that running a home is big work, and one should never, ever, TAKE A DAY OFF..

About Me

We come from a small town in Northern Canada, and we are active in Greyhound welfare and adoption. We lived and traveled extensively in the deep south for many years and had the opportunity to work with adoptable greyhounds at the race track while living in Alabama.